This invention relates to a laser surgical equipment and more particularly, to a laser surgical equipment for surgical operation.
Steel knives have been used in the past for surgical operation in hospitals but so-called laser surgical equipments using laser light have been used in recent years. FIG. 1 shows diagrammatically the construction of a typical conventional laser surgical equipment. The laser light is generated by a laser oscillator 2 such as a carbon dioxide (CO.sub.2) laser disposed inside a laser oscillation apparatus 1 and is transmitted to a desired position while being guided by a waveguide 3 such as a multi-joint reflection mirror type manipulator or an optical fiber guide. The laser light is then condensed by a hand piece 4 fitted to the tip of the waveguide 3 and is radiated to a diseased part 5 for cutting, coagulation of blood, and so forth.
During the surgical operation, the operator must frequently adjust the laser output to be emitted from the hand piece depending upon the diseased parts. For example, suitable laser output is about 20 W for skin incision, about 30 W for excision of tumor and about 50 W for amputation of bone. In the conventional laser surgical equipment, the output control of the laser light obtained from the laser oscillator 2 is effected by operating a manual control device 8 disposed on a control panel 7 of a laser oscillation control apparatus 6 and by controlling the oscillation current by a laser controller 9 disposed inside the laser oscillation control apparatus. In this case, a power meter 13 consisting of a beam splitter 11 and a photo-detector 12 for detecting the reflected light from the beam splitter 11, for example, is disposed inside the optical path in the vicinity of the emitting portion of the laser oscillator 2 in order to detect the laser output and the output of the detector 12 is fed to a laser power indicator 10 to check the laser power. In accordance with this detection method, however, the laser power at the diseased part 5 can not be detected. In other words, there occurs the problem that changes of the laser power arising from deviation of the optical axis of the waveguide 3, fatigue of the reflecting mirror, fatigue of condenser lenses incorporated in the hand piece 4 and so forth can not be corrected. This problem results in the drop of so-called "beam depth (sharpness)" and critically affects the life itself of a patient because coagulation of blood at the bleeding part becomes impossible due to the shortage of the laser power, for example.
In the conventional laser surgical equipment, further, if the laser output at the tip of the hand piece drops, it is not possible to correctly determine at which portion or portions of the laser oscillator, waveguide and hand piece the problem occurs. This is the fatal problem for medical equipment in general which must always operate stably.